Severe wildfires burning 8 times more area in western U.S., study finds
According to a new study, there’s been an eight-fold increase since the mid-1980s in annual area burned by high-severity wildfires — defined as a fire that kills more than 95% of trees. The transformation in fire behavior has happened fast, with this exponential increase happening in just one generation over the course of 30 years. These more intense fires have a lasting impact on the ecosystem…Five of the six largest fires in California history and three of the four largest in Colorado history all burned this year.
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